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[Reelya]

Street battles don't achieve the thing you want however. That's a false dichotomy between ignoring them, and hitting them on the head with bats.

Charlottesville would be a long forgotten minor even if not for the swarms of protestors, ensuring it became a worldwide media circus. I'm sure a lot more conservatives heard about all of the groups involved because of the spectacle.

Similarly, Patriot Prayer's entire strategy is built around getting a reaction from Antifa. It's the basis of their formation, and their entire business strategy. The guy who formed it said he did so in response to seeing videos of left-wingers beating up Trump supporters after a rally back in 2016. That's proto-Antifa right there, assigning the Nazi label to the half of the country who "vote wrong".

This is how you lose them folks, when you label half the nation as Nazis, and not just actual flag-bearing Nazis, you water down what a Nazi is. If you say all Republicans might as well be called Nazis, you make actual Nazis seem more palatable. Hell, Trekkin here wouldn't even back down from labeling moderates as might-as-well-be-Nazis last time I pushed him on it. If you throw around the Nazi label as a blanket statement then you do in fact desensitize people to it, and you make it like if you're called a Nazi you must be "doing something right" to get the attention.

That's why you play into the right's hands when someone says something fairly innocuous such as "there are only two genders" and you call them a Nazi over it. You're basically giving them the game (and Laci Green got called a Nazi over much less than that).

[sluissa]

The people marching with tiki torches may support the president, and the president may support the people marching with tiki torches. But they're not the same, they're not even directly connected.

Punching one doesn't hurt the other.

[Il Palazzo]

No.  That is a complete departure from what has been said so far. 

I'm driving this in response to the idea that has been repeated over and over again here and every other place this discussion has ever happened that the proper response to fascists is to ignore them.

I've been following this discussion for its entire length, I think. I haven't seen anyone advocate ignoring them.

[smjjames]

Kind of sounds like the main solution is for both sides to agree to stop the hyperpartianship and dial down from 22, only problem is that it's a self reinforcing spiral atm especially with Trumps rhetoric and neither side wants to be seen as the first to capitulate.

[Reelya]

No.  That is a complete departure from what has been said so far. 

I'm driving this in response to the idea that has been repeated over and over again here and every other place this discussion has ever happened that the proper response to fascists is to ignore them.

I've been following this discussion for its entire length, I think. I haven't seen anyone advocate ignoring them.

The sensible goal is to deplatform them. Turning up with 1000 protestors to a rally that has 30 right-wingers is not achieving that goal.

[Kagus]

No.  That is a complete departure from what has been said so far. 

I'm driving this in response to the idea that has been repeated over and over again here and every other place this discussion has ever happened that the proper response to fascists is to ignore them.

I've been following this discussion for its entire length, I think. I haven't seen anyone advocate ignoring them.

The sensible goal is to deplatform them. Turning up with 1000 protestors to a rally that has 30 right-wingers is not achieving that goal.

That said, there was a demonstration here in Norway a while ago where a few folks from the alt-right anti-immigrant group SIAN were holding a speech about how Islam is super dangerous and it's taking over this country (note that they were holding this speech in one of the areas most heavily populated by Muslim immigrants... Not sure what they were trying to accomplish). Almost the entirety of the crowd were protesters (including a few folks waving black and red flags, which is apparently an Antifa thing? I'm not up on my colors) who very neatly ringed the whole operation and just stood there with their backs turned to the dorks the entire time.

While that may not have done much to deplatform SIAN, it was pretty fucking funny... And it was nice to see such a turnout of people who very expressly did not want to listen to hatespeech.

[sluissa]

No.  That is a complete departure from what has been said so far. 

I'm driving this in response to the idea that has been repeated over and over again here and every other place this discussion has ever happened that the proper response to fascists is to ignore them.

I've been following this discussion for its entire length, I think. I haven't seen anyone advocate ignoring them.

I actually have been advocating ignoring them. At least the ineffectual "march with signs and torches about dumb things" groups. If someone gets ACTUALLY violent. Let the law handle it. That's what it's there for. As for the groups doing effective propaganda through either the larger media or social media, that's a different question. But ignoring people you don't agree with on the street is the proper response. Marching and yelling is just an outlet for energy that could be used for worse things. Let them tire themselves.

[Doomblade187]

Kind of sounds like the main solution is for both sides to agree to stop the hyperpartianship and dial down from 22, only problem is that it's a self reinforcing spiral atm especially with Trumps rhetoric and neither side wants to be seen as the first to capitulate.

Problem is, the first side to dial down will get swept away by the other, at least if they start cooperating legislatively. And I'm not about to give up on getting the Us an actual left wing party.

Spoiler: Paradox of Tolerance (click to show/hide)

[img=http://wy3mg1xgify37n21x223cw7xl1-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/HcuZIT5w8xJLMXoISDexG1GNz5Dj7xHO_QGeueMtdPU.jpg][/img]

More reading!

This is why fascists lean on civility so hard. It's not out of any respect from the system. It's because they know they can get away with it and abuse the system to get into power. Then use that power to eliminate the tolerant.

Point: The Hong Kong protests are antifa. Literally antifascist action. They assault police officers and block major roads and transportation systems. The fights are so prolonged and continuous because their government took things too far.

We haven't yet seen our government reach that far. I'd rather like that to not be the case. Antifa now likely means less fascism down the line as they're forced back into hiding. Especially after this president gets elected out and the damage he's done gets fixed.

The Hong Kong are literally anticommunists standing up to the government of China, lol

One can be both - China is pretty fascist.

Edit: Sluissa: Nah, drown them out. Do the DC thing where they got so scared by the turnout maybe 2 dozen showed up

[Reelya]

(including a few folks waving black and red flags, which is apparently an Antifa thing? I'm not up on my colors)

That's not an Antifa thing, it's the Anarchist flag of the Spanish CNT. Considering how that ended up, running street battles vs Fascists doesn't have a particularly good track record.

Also, as to the effect that protesting right-wingers actually had in history:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturmabteilaung

The precursor to the Sturmabteilung had acted informally and on an ad hoc basis for some time before this. Hitler, with an eye always to helping the party to grow through propaganda, convinced the leadership committee to invest in an advertisement in the Münchener Beobachter (later renamed the Völkischer Beobachter) for a mass meeting in the Hofbräuhaus, to be held on 16 October 1919. Some 70 people attended, and a second such meeting was advertised for 13 November in the Eberl-Bräu beer hall. About 130 people attended; there were hecklers, but Hitler's military friends promptly ejected them by force, and the agitators "flew down the stairs with gashed heads". The next year, on 24 February, he announced the party's Twenty-Five Point program at a mass meeting of some 2,000 people at the Hofbräuhaus. Protesters tried to shout Hitler down, but his former army companions, armed with rubber truncheons, ejected the dissenters. The basis for the SA had been formed.

The future SA developed by organizing and formalizing the groups of ex-soldiers and beer hall brawlers who were to protect gatherings of the Nazi Party from disruptions from Social Democrats (SPD) and Communists (KPD)

The Nazi Party held a large public meeting in the Munich Hofbräuhaus on 4 November 1921, which also attracted many Communists and other enemies of the Nazis. After Hitler had spoken for some time, the meeting erupted into a mêlée in which a small company of SA thrashed the opposition. The Nazis called this event the Saalschlacht ("meeting hall battle"), and it assumed legendary proportions in SA lore with the passage of time. Thereafter, the group was officially known as the Sturmabteilung.

By the end of 1933, the SA numbered over three million men

Very (not) effective, the tactic of physically disrupting the right-wingers while they are still small.

EDIT: The point here, is that it didn't work, in fact it probably had the opposite effect, acted as publicity while spurring the Nazis to really ramp their shit into gear from a few guys up to millions of guys. A lot of those people who signed up to the SA, not a small chunk of the total population mind you, might have joined up as much because they disliked the Communists and Anarchists as they did because they liked the Nazis.

Also, the idea that if you don't nip some literal actual swastika-waving loonies in the bud with street violence then USA 2020 is going to turn into Germany 1933. It's also borderline insane as an argument. That's just not going to happen.

[Arx]

I'd like to throw in a quick note:

Once physical violence is brought in as a "means of protest" or whatever, to anyone not directly involved the entire thing changes dramatically. It's no longer "left vs. right" or whatever, it's "people who might hurt me" and "people who probably won't hurt me".

I don't like antifa because masked thugs who have the same (or similar) ideology as me are just as bad as masked thugs who don't, when the brick hits the window. I'm speaking from experience; it's absolutely zero comfort to know that someone fundamentally wants the same things as you when they're running around threatening anyone not sufficiently obviously on their side. I've been threatened by people "on my side" and cleaned up the mess left by people "on my side".

When I say I don't like antifa, I don't mean I like fascists, or fascist rallies. I mean I don't like people that prepare to do violence, and I especially don't like those who conceal their identities along with it.

[Frumple]

Problem being stateside that not concealing your identity is borderline suicide, at least if you're not rightwing. It's definitely a ticket to getting your life indefinitely fucked over by cops and friends.

[Reelya]

Also, isn't that Antifa excess a clear case of Toxic Masculinity? Or does beating people up not count, but sitting with your legs too wide apart on public transport does?

[sluissa]

Problem being stateside that not concealing your identity is borderline suicide, at least if you're not rightwing. It's definitely a ticket to getting your life indefinitely fucked over by cops and friends.

You're missing the point if you think the problem is the masks alone.

[Kagus]

Also, isn't that Antifa excess a clear case of Toxic Masculinity? Or does beating people up not count, but sitting with your legs too wide apart on public transport does?

I, uh... Where did this come from?

[Reelya]

Hm, breaking that down.

1) "Toxic Masculinity" is a common statement that people on the same side as Antifa often make.

2) All the Antifa people causing violence are young males, clearly exhibiting the same toxic masculinity behavior patterns (reveling in violence with a flimsy excuse of righteousness)

3) the last bit was a dig at "man-spreading" which is said to be toxic masculinity (sitting wrong) but the people who complain about manspreading being toxic masculinity don't label beating people up the same way, if they don't like the people being beaten up.